Conference USA add five new members

Conference USA announced Friday that five schools have agreed to join: Charlotte, Florida International, Louisiana Tech, North Texas and Texas-San Antonio.

Each member will join the league in all sports in 2013. Charlotte must play a mandatory two years on the Football Championship Subdivision level and won’t join the league in football until 2015.

The new teams will join East Carolina, Marshall, Rice, Southern Miss, Tulane, Tulsa, UAB and UTEP to form a 13-team league.

The divisions will be announced at a later date. C-USA also plans to continue hosting a football championship game.

“We are excited about adding these new members as part of our bold strategy that focuses on growing institutions in large media markets,” C-USA commissioner Britton Banowsky said. “There is a tremendous upside here. This is an opportunity for us to add a mixture of established and emerging programs. We also remain committed to divisional scheduling models that are student-athlete and fan-friendly. The more we analyzed it, the more it made sense.”

C-USA and the Mountain West will continue to discuss a future affiliation that could begin as early as 201. Additional expansion remains a possibility, the leagues said in a statement.

“The discussions with the Mountain West are ongoing,” Banowsky said. “What form the relationship will take is still to be determined, but both remain committed to working together.”